Mr Parker's first major challenge will be to see
through Dow's purchase of Union Carbide, the chemicals group, announced in August 1999.
Today the all-stock deal carries a value of about $5.8bn. "This was a very exciting
merger for Dow," Mr Parker says. "We have technological synergies and good
chemistry - we expect to get a lot of value out of this."

The European Union has cleared the Union Carbide purchase; the US
Federal Trade Commission has yet to finish reviewing antitrust concerns. Unlike his
predecessor, William Stavropoulos, the 54-year-old Parker declines to offer a timetable
for Dow's acquisition, however. Mr Stavropoulos had originally predicted a complete stock
takeover by April 2000, a guess that Mr Parker acknowledges had been optimistic.

Perhaps even more tricky than antitrust concerns will be overcoming
Union Carbide's reputation. A toxic leak from a chemical plant in 1984 caused killed
thousands of nearby villagers in Bhopal, India. For many, memory of the incident persists
to this day.

"Clearly, we're enormously aware of Bhopal and the fact that the
particular incident is associated with Union Carbide," he says. "It was a huge
event and a great tragedy." But the group since then has "done what it needs to
do to pursue the correct environment, health and safety programmes. We at Dow have been
pursuing ours."